Media captionRecent attacks have provoked discussion about social and economic inequality, the BBC's Lucy Williamson reports

A series of small blasts have killed at least one person outside a provincial office of the ruling Communist Party in northern China, state media report.

The blasts in Taiyuan in Shanxi province appeared to have been caused by home-made bombs, Xinhua reported.

It said eight people had been injured and two cars damaged.

Photos posted on social media showed smoke and several fire engines at the scene of the incident, which happened around 07:40 local time (23:40 GMT).

No immediate explanation has been given for the incident. There have been occasions in the past where disgruntled citizens have targeted local government institutions.

Analysis

By Jo FlotoBBC News, Beijing

They do not often make the headlines but explosions in China's cities are not unheard of. Earlier this year, in another part of Shanxi Province, Chinese media reported that a bomb exploded outside the house of a local law official, killing his daughter. The culprit was a pensioner enraged by a court ruling against him.

Last year the BBC reported on a suicide bombing in Shandong, carried out by a disabled man upset by lack of compensation for an industrial accident. Every year there are examples of attacks with crude weapons or explosives, carried out by the desperate, the dispossessed and the disturbed, usually triggered by a dispute with some arm of local government or a local official.

It's too early to say whether the explosions on Wednesday follow the same pattern. But some details will worry the authorities: the ball bearings apparently placed inside the bombs, increasing their destructive power; the fact that witnesses reported several explosions over a period of time. And the bombs were placed outside the local Communist Party headquarters - was the party itself the target, or was this just the product of a local dispute?

The authorities will especially be nervous after last week's apparent suicide attack outside the gates of the Forbidden City, especially as the capital also prepares to host a meeting of China's Communist Party elite on Saturday.

Tensions are also high in the wake of last week's incident in Beijing. A car ploughed into a crowd in Tiananmen Square in what the authorities said was a terrorist attack incited by extremists from the western region of Xinjiang.

Later this week, the Communist Party's top officials will meet in Beijing to start a major economic planning meeting.

'Seven loud blasts'

"Several small explosive devices went off at Taiyuan's Yingze Street near the provincial party office," Shanxi police said in a post on their verified microblog.

"Provincial leaders went to the scene immediately, and police are currently investigating the case," the post added.